Similarities in the Short Stories "A Good Man is Hard to Find" and "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"

When first reading the two short stories, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" and "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?", the similarities in the narratives may not seem readily apparent. But upon closer analysis, one can find numerous similarities in the writing styles and techniques used by the authors, Flannery O'Connor and Joyce Carol Oates, respectively.

The protagonist of each story is female: Oates' central focus is on the teenaged Connie and O'Connor's nameless character is simply, "the grandmother". Obviously from different generations and of different ages, they share several common characteristics that lead to key parallels in the stories. The fact that both characters are vain, selfish, and self-centered is most apparent.

The grandmother's selfishness is first presented in the fact that she takes her cat with her on vacation, "because he would miss her too much and she was afraid he might brush against one of the gas burners and accidentally asphyxiate himself" (O'Connor 1097). Cats are known as being independent, and it is more likely that the grandmother would miss the cat and not the other way around. Her reasons for smuggling the cat into the car were purely selfish and not for the cat's benefit. Connie's selfishness is also readily evident. She thinks only of herself and her own pleasure through the early paragraphs of the story. On the fateful Sunday when Arnold Friend comes to visit, Connie shuns the family barbecue, "rolling her eyes to let her mother know just what she thought of it" (Oates 2129). Connie's egotistical behavior, while typical of many teenagers, was inconsiderate of her family's feelings.

Both Connie and the grandmother also manipulate the other members of their families, another conceited trait. The grandmother, "knew that Bailey would not be willing to lose any time looking at an old house, but the more she talked about it, the more she wanted to see it once again" (O'Connor 2118). She then specifically engaged her grandchildren in her story, knowing that they would beg to see the old plantation. Connie's manipulative behavior revolves mostly around the manipulation of her mother so she can go out at night to meet boys. Connie innocently believes that her mother does not see through Connie's lies, "Her mother was so simple, Connie thought, that it was maybe cruel to fool her so much" (Oates 2128). Instead, Connie's mother, while not knowing the extent of Connie's behavior, probably knows there is more to Connie's conduct than Connie realizes.

Both protagonists also lie throughout each story, and one could reach the conclusion that each heroine's lies leads to her demise. It is because of the grandmother's lies regarding the plantation that the family finds itself on the dusty road, "'There was a secret panel in this house,' she said craftily, not telling the truth but wishing that she were..." (O'Connor 2118). Once travelling down the deserted road, the grandmother's lie of omission concerning her stowaway cat causes the family to wreck, leading to its encounter with the Misfit. In comparison, Connie's deceptive actions towards the adults in Oates' story result in a situation where Connie attempts to appear young and innocent in their eyes so that she can be free to explore her teenage sexuality, "and her mother was simple and kind enough to believe it" (Oates 2128).

While the behavior of both characters is neither purely innocent nor free from sin, their actions are not purely evil either. So in that respect, one could view both stories as a tale of good versus evil, as the criminals of each story, O'Connor's Misfit and Oates' Arnold Friend, represent true corruption and evil. Still, one could also argue that the criminals' purpose in each story is to punish each character for her sins and the egotistical behavior she displays early in each story. Both story lines have created the same situation: one in which the female character's wrong doings have been shown through her behavior, and then she is confronted by a devilish male character and pays the ultimate sacrifice as the penance for her sins.

While all these factors make both stories intensely fascinating, the most intriguing similarity between the stories is the authors' use of point of view. Both stories employ a similar technique of presentation that could be considered a hybrid of first person and third person. From a technical point view, both stories are written in the typical fashion that would be called third person, as if presented from an outsider's perspective. But even though it is written this way, we still hear both stories through the voice of the central female lead characters.

This is readily apparent at the very beginning of, "A Good Man is Hard to Find". The very second sentence, while written in the third person point of view, distinctly takes us into the mind of the grandmother, "She wanted to visit some of her connections in east Tennessee and she was seizing at every chance to change Bailey's mind" (O'Connor 2114). The result is engaging: we are able to follow the family through its vacation adventure, but through the eyes of the grandmother. We are never allowed glimpses into the minds of the other characters, only the grandmother.

This technique continues to appear throughout the story. Our quick peeks into the thoughts of the grandmother are not constant, but they pop up frequently enough to allow the reader to form an opinion regarding the grandmother's self-centered nature. For example, we learn that the grandmother has dressed the car trip in her Sunday best because, "In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady" (O'Connor 2114).

This technique is equally obvious in Oates' story. Again, from the second sentence the reader clearly sees that the story is Connie's, "she had a quick, nervous giggling habit of craning her neck to glance into mirrors or checking other people's faces to make sure her own was all right" (Oates 2126). Even though the idea is presented in third person, the reader is able to see into Connie's thoughts. As the story progresses, the author presents the reader with these insights to highlight Connie's self-centered character as well as her views concerning sexuality: "how sweet it always was, not the way someone like June would suppose but sweet, gentle, the way it was in movies and promised in songs" (Oates 2129). Giving the reader a glimpse into these aspects of Connie's mind is significant in that is sets her character up for the ultimate downfall once Arnold Friend arrives. Her past behavior has put her into a situation in which she cannot escape. This technique also allows the reader to be able to relate to Connie and sympathize with her character, as teenagers commonly employ several aspects of her behavior as they push the limits of their freedom while growing up.

There are many additional aspects of each story in which further analysis could be made: What are the significance of the trees and woods throughout O'Connor's story? How does Oates use music throughout her story, and what is the relevance of its dedication to Bob Dylan? What religious statements are both authors attempting to make? What makes the criminal characters in each story behave the way they do? By combining all these elements and more, Flannery O'Connor and Joyce Carol Oates have constructed two bizarre but engaging stories that demand further investigation by the reader.

Works Cited

Lauter, Paul. The Heath Anthology of American Literature, Volume 2. 4^th ed. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002.

Oates, Joyce Carol. "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" Lauter. 2126 - 2138.

O'Connor, Flannery. "A Good Man is Hard To Find." Lauter. 2114 - 2124